Star Game: Interactive Astronomy
Introduction: Motion capture with physical movement can be a great tool for educational purposes. The ideas from our individual projects were not intended for learning. However, the collaboration of our original ideas when put together produced a program designed for drawing constellations. The initial idea was a little different for what we had planned for when developing the project. This will be discussed in detail in future development. The developed final project is to have the user draw a constellation with his or her right had. The user is to stand in front of the Xbox Kinect to initiate the body capture. After the user is captured a white dot will appear on a screen in correlation with where the right hand is located. The user is to move their hand to the first star on the left side of the screen, moving to the next star on the right and so fourth until the image is complete. During this process each star will have an auditory sound effect when located with the white dot. Furthermore, a white line will appear from one star to the next drawing the image. After all the stars have been located a drawing of a constellation will appear. With our project we chose the “Big Dipper”, because it is recognized by nearly everyone. To restart the program the user will clap to clear the image from the screen. This project would be a great tool for someone that wanted to learn what each constellation looked like with bodily interaction. (Project Working Environment)
Technology:
During this semester the class has used “MaxMsp” to develop multiple projects. With the Individual assignment we were to develop an interactive program using the Xbox Kinect. The class was given Synapse, a MaxMsp patch that is used to capture joint tracking of the body. The Kinect is used as a motion tracker, and Synapse for analyzing the multiple appendages. This type of software/hardware combo is necessary for the development of our program. Speakers were also used to provide feedback aurally for the user when they successfully located a star. An external microphone was placed away from the speakers to correspond with the clap detection for the program. If placed to close to the speakers the microphone would pick up the sounds of the audio effects. It is essential for the microphone to interpret the clap detection at different amplitudes for it to work correctly. A screen or monitor is needed for visual feedback. The larger the screen the better. Context: After developing this program it reminded me of going on a field trip to the science museum when I was younger. The museum was interactive and educational. In today’s society almost everything is done with the use of technology, including education. With some of the research we came across an interactive learning website for education. This site has many educational subjects. You can choose from fun, educational, interactive games and simulations for math, english language arts, science, social studies, brainteasers, music, art, holidays and more! However, science is where our project would be preeminent. Below are a few interactive games that are similar to ours. [5] http://interactivesites.weebly.com/constellations.html) The object of this interactive educational game is to find the constellation Draco. The user is able to scroll over a button to see the constellation map if you are having trouble locating the constellation. After finding the constellation you click on it with the cursor to move on to the next constellation. A sound is made when selecting the right image. This project and a few others could have an influence on were our project could be used in the educational field.
The image below is an interactive game that is used for information about particular stars. You are able to select different stars with your cursor, which appear after they are selected. For example Betelgeuse is selected below with information about the constellation on the right side of the screen. Our project “star game” is aim to teach people the different constellations by using their body motion. They learn through their drawing by their own body movement. So the “star game” is a combination between drawing and education.
In the field of education, according to Kolb’s learning theory[3], the more learning styles is used the better outcome will be. There are four types of learning styles which include feeling, doing, watching and thinking. In our embodied interaction project, user should use their body movement to connect the stars, also their eyes should focus on the screen. In order to reach each star, they need to think and feel where it is through walking around the space. Therefore, users could use the combination of four learning styles when they are using it. Not like the traditional education program, which only contain mouse-click and keyboard typing. Our patch could give them a better efficiency in remembering every constellation. Feedback: During the digital culture showcase we observed many interactions with “Star Game”. Although, there were instructions most of the users had to be told how to use the game. The interface worked well and the audio effects were a great feedback to let the user know when they connected to each star. We did have a few comments on if there were multiple constellations. As a group we would have liked to have multiple constellations you could interact with. Furthermore, some of the users had a tough time connecting with the highest star. Even though we told them they could move around when they cannot reach some stars in the beginning instruction part, few of them would like to move a lot forward or backward. Instead they will stand on their toes as the instinct when they could not reach the tallest star. But when they were told they could lay down to reach the lowest one, most of them did it. Overall, people enjoyed our project and gave us some great comments. (Digital Culture Showcase 12/8/2012)
Future Development:
The initial idea was a little more developed from what we produced. Tyler’s individual assignment had a few other interactions that could be eminent in the expansion of our project. Initially we wanted our project to work in stages. What we came up with was just the start of the program. What we have developed is a practice tool for the final quiz. We would have the user practice his or her use of drawing the constellation. We also wanted to have multiple constellations to draw. After the user felt confident knowing how to draw each constellation they would go to the next step. Stars would appear on the screen and the user would draw the constellation free hand. When finished the correct drawing would fade in from the background showing how close or exact the users drawing is. After doing research and seeing some other projects that have been developed we would like to add an additional educational tool that could inform the users of the history of the constellation and the important stars within them.This would be done by adding audio and short video clips. To incorporate more than just hand gestures, we had hoped to add in the skeletal mapping to the star game. It is one thing to draw a star map, but it is quite another thing to embody a constellation. Using the skeletal mapper, we would allow users an opportunity to try and recreate the constellation at hand with their own person. Of course making a big dipper out of a person is challenging, and may be difficult for the Kinect to keep up with, but it could be a lot more fun, and definitely more immersive. Individual Reflection: Wes: Within the final project we first had to develop our own. My project was not for education purposes but for rehabilitation. I have seen many individuals go through physical therapy from injuries they have had, including myself. Like many people it’s hard to put your life on hold to find the time to go to treatment everyday. Wouldn’t it be helpful to have an interactive physical therapist whenever you wanted? I have developed a device that allows you to continue therapy in your own home. The user is able to initiate the appendage that needs therapy through Synapse. For example, after the hand is selected the user can reach to a box that is located on the screen. If they reach the box and a sound is made, the repetition is done. They are given an amount of reps to complete each day until the user feels their therapy is complete. The West Health Institute has developed an application that uses Kinect and motion tracking for physical therapy for in home use. The program is called the Reflexion Rehabilitation Measurement Tool or (RMT). This program allows physical therapists to make specific treatment plans and schedules that monitor patients to make sure they are doing the exercise correctly. With the Kinect this program has the capabilities to offer educational materials and interactive feedback to patients. With RMT the patient can plug the Kinect into a computer install the program and turn on their T.V. to do the exercises in front of the screen. However, what is different from my design is that the RMT has wearable devices that have sensors to track health and fitness. RMT also has an on-screen education message from the patient’s therapist and a on-screen avatar that guides you through the exercise with feedback if you're doing the exercise incorrectly. The therapist can then review the records to determine what needs to be changes in the exercise schedule. [11] Yanfei: Even though my individual project was focus on body movements drawing, it also had an educational aim that was to inspire users do the creative painting. Luckily, our final project was still focused on the area of education. This led me to think about the relationship between Kinect or embodied interaction design and teaching. By the middle of the year in 2009, 1.5 million children were learning at home, an increase of 75 percent since 1999. What’s more, the Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics reported the population of homeschooling has risen by 36 percent from 2005 to 2009. Although the number of homeschooling students highly increases in recent decade, parents are still not the professional experts in teaching their kids. Especially in today, they need the assistance from different kinds of learning websites. After a rough survey on the existed E-learning websites, I divided them into two parts. One part is still using traditional ways to teach even though they said they introduced the interaction design into it. The interactive part is only use mouse click and keyboard typing. The other group is the so called game based learning websites, but in fact most of the games have nothing to do with the learning content. Interactive design plays a significant role to websites, especially for E-learning websites. Interactive design, which includes interface design, information design and interactivity, not only affects the usability of the websites, but also has an impact on the users’ efficiency in understanding its information. For example, Drave (2000) suggests that the quality of interactivity is more important than content for the success of learning; Sim (1997) believes that interactivity plays a crucial role in knowledge acquisition and the development of cognitive skills[6]. Even though the interaction design is such important to online education, the existed online websites did not do a satisfactory job as much as we expected. So for my future study, I will try to build a new E-learning website which could take use of the Kinect or Wii-mote with it, therefore it no more only contains animation and mouse clicks, it will offer the users an embodied interaction during they are learning online. Thereby students could improve the learning efficiency and they could also build their interest through this learning system. Tyler:I’m very happy with my initial project. I learned a lot along the way and through many many hours of experimentation. Looking back at it, I believe their are so many ways of doing it better and more efficiently, but I would have never known had I not tried initially. Max is powerful, too powerful for its own good. The capabilities of the software force programmers to think extremely concisely and specifically. General concepts don’t get you anywhere. I found that in experimenting with the hardware (Kinect and Wiimote) and software I had discovered many neat tricks and features but I really struggled with making it amount to anything worthwhile. Its probably because I’m working on creating art that I find valuable at the same time in my graduate studies, I can’t divorce a project like this from something artistic at the same time. I think the technologies used in this class have massive possibilities for artistic expression, and I was so happy to see people experimenting with it. The “orion project” as I referred to it personally, was my first stab at combining media installation with live performance. I think that the art world is in desperate need of performers who can successfully integrate this type of software and control of media into live theater. I know it may be a personal preference, but this work has given me huge hope for the future of art in general and for me personally. I feel like I have a direction to focus my energies towards. At the same time, I look at other projects and see how they have chosen to use these projects to help others. I believe that art does help people, and being able to keep up with the blindingly fast rate at which we as a society devour new technology makes this work important. I hope to continue learning the software so that it can become like 2nd nature when programming. I have a lot of experience with embodied work, and having a full digital and physical play ground to work and create in opens up doors for me. REFERENCES [1]Bulotsky-Shearer, Rebecca. J., Manz, P. H., Mendez, J.L., McWayne, C.M., Sekino, Y. & Fantuzzo, J. W. Peer Play Interactions and Readiness to Learn: A Protective Influence for African American Preschool Children From Low-Income Households. Child Development Perspectives, 6(3), 225-231. (2012) [2]Mitchell, G., Clarke, A., & Villas, E. 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